


2400 Hours

by RosalindBeatrice



Category: Star Trek: Enterprise
Genre: Episode: S3E21 E², F/M, First Time, Heterosexual Sex, Original Character(s), Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-31
Updated: 2020-07-31
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:53:45
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,919
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25622434
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RosalindBeatrice/pseuds/RosalindBeatrice
Summary: Set during Star Trek: ENT Season 3, Episode 21 "E²." The ship's anthropologist, Ensign Millay, and Lieutenant Malcolm Reed have a heated disagreement about the generational ship. But is there something more to that disagreement?
Relationships: Malcolm Reed/Original Character(s), Malcolm Reed/Original Female Character(s), Malcolm Reed/Other(s)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 16





	2400 Hours

When the electronic buzzer at the door sounded at 2100 hours, Ensign Millay assumed Corporal Chang had come to return _Stranger in a Strange Land_. He was a fast reader, finishing one of her antique science-fiction novels every two to three days. When he and the other MACOs first came aboard, she was only being polite when she inquired about his favorite books. The Captain had told them to be friendly, after all. She was surprised when Chang responded with a long list of classic twentieth and twenty-first-century authors: LeGuin, Bradbury, Octavia Butler, Matsumoto, Adalbert Cociemski. She'd packed her grandfather's sci-fi collection to keep her company, knowing that they could be away for five to seven years, and it was nice to have someone to share it with.

It was not Corporal Chang at the door, however, it was Lieutenant Reed.

"Ensign," he said. "Might I come in?"

"Of course," she said, pushing the surprise from her voice. 

He sank onto the sofa, the end farthest from her, and she took a seat on the edge of the bed, which was joined perpendicularly to the sofa. She wished she'd answered the door in her robe. Not that her pajamas, a long-sleeved top and loose-fitting bottoms, weren't modest, but Lieutenant Reed wasn’t the sort of person she wanted to be caught out of uniform in front of. All seriousness and stiff upper lip, that was Reed’s hallmark. His mere presence made one want to stick very closely to protocol, something you expected from a captain, not a weapons officer.

Nor was it like him to come visiting. In fact, he'd been in her quarters just twice in the past three years. The first time was six months after the journey began, when she'd tried her hand at some English recipes and invited the ship’s Brits, Ensigns Adebayo and Entwhistle, over for dinner. Reed, a fellow countryman but higher in rank and seldom in her social orbit, had been an afterthought. She'd extended an invitation thinking that he might be grateful for some native comfort food, but he worked his way through the bangers 'n' mash and Yorkshire puddings in a perfunctory way, offering only grunts and flickers of a smile when spoken to. He kept an eye on the door the entire time, as if suspecting a booby-trap. After he left (before dessert), she got the feeling that Captain Archer might have forced his attendance.

She tried again a year later, asking Reed over for tea, just the two of them. All of the crew members had bonded to other crew members--she was still hanging out with Adebayo and Entwhistle every other Wednesday night--but Reed alone remained as solitary as ever. Commander Tucker joined him sometimes in the mess hall and they could be observed laughing together, but more often than not Reed stayed hunched over his PADD during mealtimes and frequently left before he'd finished his food. In the corridors, he managed to be both friendly and curt at the same time. Nothing he said to the crewman, at least the non-senior ones, was designed to provoke further conversation. He was businesslike in almost every respect. The few times he seemed to come alive were during crises; although he handled them calmly, she could see the excitement simmering beneath his professional exterior. The tea with him went no better than dinner had. Her questions seemed to die as soon as they hit the air, for as much information as they elicited. _Yes, no, no, I don't know, I didn't glimpse them all that much before I left for Starfleet, yes, I suppose it's alright, no, I've never thought about it, really_. He’d eaten only half of his strawberry scone and left in under forty-five minutes.

Yet when they entered the Expanse he thawed toward her, ever so slightly. He asked her to sit with him a few times in the mess hall. He wanted her anthropological gatherings on the Xindi to augment his tactical strategies, but with each fresh meeting he'd ask one or two questions about what she'd done prior to joining Starfleet. He never offered much about himself, but they'd spoken enough that she would say she had a friendship with him, albeit rather embryonic.

Now that he was in her quarters without invitation for the first time, she had no idea what to say to him, so she waited for him to break the ice.

"God, I'm knackered," he said, tipping his chin toward the ceiling and massaging his face in his hands. "I've just come off duty."

"I was off two hours ago but I started at 0800 this morning," she said. "They had me on C deck working on clean-up. Would have much rather spent some time on the other ship, but we're short on hands, you know." She fell silent, thinking about the eighteen lost crew members. The weight of their deaths, the thought that she or any of her friends could be robbed of their lives at any instant out here in the deep black unknown of the Expanse, made her feel fragile. She was glad to be busy to the point of exhaustion because then she could avoid thinking about it.

"Right," said Reed, distantly. He was fastidious even during times of crisis, but tonight his hair was sticking out in all directions and his uniform was covered in oil and grime. They both noticed the latter at the same time, because he followed her eyes down to his uniform and rose to his feet. "Sorry, sorry. I can take it off. Thoughtless of me." He tugged off his boots and unzipped the jumpsuit, freeing his arms from the sleeves and rolling the rest of it down his legs. Then, clad in his regulation blue trousers and black button-up, he replaced his boots. He folded the uniform and placed it on the floor next to the sofa. It was all accomplished so quickly that Ensign Millay didn't have a chance to tell him not to bother, that she wasn't in the habit of keeping her sofa immaculate.

He looked worried and brushed at the cushion.

"Don't worry about it. I'm sure it's fine," she said, feeling even more awkward. "What are you doing now that you're off?" He didn't look comfortable in the least, so she couldn't understand why he was here.

"I intend to have a long shower and turn in," he said. "We're still cleaning up in the armoury."

"So what's up?" she said. Might as well take the direct approach since he wasn't getting any more forthcoming.

He looked over and knit his eyebrows. "Well, I've been wondering what you think of this generational ship."

What a strange question. "What do you mean, what I think of it? I don't know. It's hard--" She stopped and tried to focus. "It's still hard to believe that it's Enterprise, that they're really who they say they are. It's like a science-fiction story. I mean, don't you think so?"

"No, that's not what I mean." He cleared his throat. "As an anthropologist, what's your opinion of them?"

"They're friendly, which is nice. Nice to have such friendly company in the Expanse. I'm glad that they've helped us and I suppose they seem . . ." She trailed off, sensing from the look that he was giving her that Reed still hadn't made himself clear.

He cleared his throat again and crossed his arms. "I'm thinking more about the, er, generational aspect. What's your opinion, as a professional, on that?"

As it happened, cleaning up the entire day had given her a lot of time to think about the generational ship. She and Doctor Phlox had talked at length a few weeks earlier about how irritable the crew was getting. Ensign Millay found their bad moods unsurprising given the circumstances that they were in, but Doctor Phlox insisted that if humans could just sort out their sexual hang-ups, even a dire mission like theirs would be ten times more bearable. She asked if he wasn't stretching it and he'd clucked. "Nonsense." It wasn't just sex and the release it brought, he'd explained. The majority of humans were monogamous, at least serially, and the ones aboard the Enterprise were missing out on everything that romance brought: dating, marriage, family, kinship, closeness. Shore leave in the Expanse was unthinkable, but even if they could take some, it wouldn't solve that fundamental deficiency. They needed romantic relationships as well as friendships to thrive. Of course, said Phlox, Starfleet was not apt to come around to the idea of a generational ship any time soon.

The doctor was right, naturally. You couldn't divorce relationships from the human experience. Hell, from what she'd observed so far, you couldn't divorce it from the alien experience, either. Creatures needed each other's company and companionship to thrive. 

"I think it's a good idea," she said, after pausing for a few moments. "It's good for their crew. They seem much more content and relaxed. They're very bonded to each other and I think that probably makes them work more effectively. You have to admit, it's weird that we can't date or--" She trailed off again.

"I don't find it strange," said Reed, scoffing. "We're here to serve, not to go about knocking boots and bringing children into the world."

 _Have you noticed the sexual tension in the corridors?_ she wanted to ask him, but she kept her expression straight. The man was clearly in a serious mood. "No," she said, "but this is a long-term mission. It's much different than being away for a few months. Phlox thinks that relaxing some of the rules about fraternisation could help the crew's mood."

Reed looked at her as if she'd proposed they blow up the ship. "I don't suppose the doctor has considered what a security risk that would be," he said.

"A generational ship?" she said. "Oh come on, that's ridiculous. I'm sure you've heard of child-safety locks. And there is such a thing as restricted areas. It's not that big a deal."

"It's not that I'm referring to," he said, voice dripping with scepticism. "The instant people start pairing off, they create double the security risk. Can you imagine wives, husbands, their children taken hostage by a hostile species? And we'd be doing who-knows-what to get them back? People are different, Ensign, when it's their own family and loved ones. They're much more likely to do foolish things. That's the problem here."

She took a deep breath, aware that he'd made her very tense indeed. "Look, we can agree to disagree. The Captain's not about to order a generational ship any time soon, so it's a moot point."

His arms were still folded. "Is it?" he said. "I do wonder. How long before this 'fraternisation' becomes doctor's orders?"

"It won't. And even if Phlox did get his way, being allowed to socialise a little more freely isn't the same as having children," she said.

"Am I the only one on this bloody ship who thinks this is a bad idea?" he said, throwing his palms up.

She was saved from having to answer by another buzzer at the door. "Come," she said.

Corporal Chang walked in, smiling, holding the Robert Heinlein novel she’d let him borrow in one hand. His smile faded when he caught sight of Lieutenant Reed looking steelily up at him.

"I'm sorry, am I interrupting?" said Chang.

"No," said Reed. "I'm just leaving." But he made no move to get up.

"No, we're just talking about the other ship," she said, standing up and taking the book that Chang held out to her. "Good one?"

"Very good," said Chang, smiling. "I did find it a bit--" He paused, searching. "Heteronormative."

"It's a product of its time and place, definitely," she said. "What do you want to try next?"

Chang smiled and looked over at Reed. "It's okay. I can come back when you're not busy. Have a good night."

"Okay, you too," she said, watching him nod to Reed, round the corner into the foyer, and exit the door.

With pressed lips, she re-shelved the Heinlein next to her Frank Herbert novels. Why should Reed's presence make her feel guilty about letting Corporal Chang borrow some harmless antique books? They had every right to associate. After all, platonic relationships were just as vital to human emotional needs as romantic ones. Even if Chang _did_ have a strong jaw and eyes that smiled along with his white, white teeth . . .

"So is he the one you pair off with, then?" said Reed, behind her.

"Excuse me?" she said, turning around.

"Is he the one you marry, in the future?" There was an accusatory tone to his voice.

"First off," she said, "I don't feel comfortable answering that question, sir. I don't think it’s really appropriate. Second, I'm not marrying anybody in the future, at least that I'm aware of. Do you want to explain yourself?" Now she was the one folding her arms.

"I just meant," Reed said, standing, "that with everyone 'hooking up' as you Americans say and having families, that Chang might be your intended."

"I don't know where you've gotten your ideas, but Chang and I have never hooked up. In any way. I know you must think that as an anthropologist I have a liberal attitude toward sex, but I don't. Not that it's any of your damn business, Lieutenant," she said.

"Very well then, my apologies," he said shortly. He began gathering up his jumpsuit and boots. "I'll see you in the morning."

Without another glance at her, he too disappeared around the corner and out of her room.

You unprofessional son-of-a-bitch, she wanted to spit after him, but the doors had already closed behind him.

While her job was not to analyse the crew of the Enterprise, she couldn't help but record private logs about their interactions on the off-chance that Starfleet did express an interest in the sociocultural anthropological workings of a ship on a long-term, deep space mission. She wrote about who was friends with whom, how they amused themselves off-duty, what the interactions of the various crewpersons with members of alien species were like, and the ways in which they were all coping with three years straight in space. She, knowing herself and her relationships best, of course featured prominently in the logs. The logs were how she remembered the details of her interactions with Lieutenant Reed--or at least that fiction held up until she would pass him in the corridors and her heart would mysteriously beat faster.

The truth was, she had gotten to like him as she’d gotten to know him. More than like him. He had an appealing sense of humour, dry and cynical, but with a tantalising touch of warmth and merriment that made her want to know him better. She wondered why, as a good-looking man in his early forties, he didn’t have a spouse or a long-term partner.

She’d known when she signed up with Starfleet that it probably meant years of celibacy, regardless of the lurid rumors circulated by crew who had been on short trial missions before Enterprise launched. What she hadn’t bargained on was how hard that would be. At three weeks, celibacy had felt like a piece of cake. At three years, it was a constant struggle. The fresh infusion of MACOs was just further agony, with soldiers like Corporal Chang now in her midst.

And of all of the crew members to fall for, it just had to be Reed, the one person aboard the ship who could out-military the military with his dedication to rules and regulations, the one person who seemed to be--as far as she could tell--asexual.

When the buzzer sounded just before 2400 hours, she was sleepily thumbing through _Stranger in a Strange Land_ and her resentment toward Lieutenant Reed was finally starting to fade a little. “Hello?” she called out, wondering who in the universe could be at her door at midnight on a weeknight. Maybe a crew member had indulged in some synthehol at the end of a long day and mistaken her quarters for someone else’s. She was absolved of that fleeting guess when a voice belonging to Reed said “just me, I’m afraid” into the comm box outside the door.

She answered the door warily. “Lieutenant.” He was wearing his black button-up and blue trousers as before, but was grime-free, as if he’d showered. This conjecture was confirmed seconds later as he stepped inside and she caught a waft of shampoo. It was the shampoo that they all used, but smelled much nicer on him for some reason. She resented herself for the thought.

“I know it’s late, forgive me,” he said, standing in the narrow space that passed for her cabin’s foyer, “but I wanted to apologise.” His hands were knitted behind his back. “What I said earlier was inappropriate and unprofessional. I had a long day and I overreacted.”

She regarded him, weighing whether to accept the apology promptly or let him squirm for a couple moments.

Reed sighed. “I wanted to explain things.”

”Oh?” she said, in a tone that communicated he was not yet forgiven.

“You may as well know I was—jealous.”

She felt as though someone had just shaken all her organs upside-down; she’d read that had happened to someone before once, in an early transporter accident, and she was sure she now knew how it felt.

“And I realise,” he continued, “that it’s also inappropriate to tell you that, but I respect you and felt you were entitled to the truth. I had to get it off my chest.” He looked at her for a beat, then turned away. “Have a good night,” he said to the door.

“Wait,” she said, stepping forward. “What do you mean jealous?”

He sighed again, looking over his shoulder as he said, “If this other crew is to be believed, the Reed line ends with me. Whilst everyone else on the ship ends up happily ever after.”

To say she was astonished was an understatement. Reed had never been this open before. “So you’re jealous of what could happen if we get stuck here,” she said. “Because everyone else finds a partner and you don’t.” The hope that had started to rise in her flickered out. She’d been getting ahead of herself.

“Yes,” he said, his expression indecipherable. “I suppose you could put it that way.”

“Well, what way _would_ you put it?” she said.

“I don’t want to cross any more lines. I’d prefer to leave it at that,” he said, taking a step toward the door.

“No,” she said, the hope beginning to light her from within again. She grabbed his elbow and was faintly aware of the excited thrill that jolted through her at the contact. “You’re jealous of Corporal Chang. That’s what you mean, isn’t it? You said it earlier, you think we pair up in the future.”

Reed looked like he was going to deny it, then sagged a little. He nodded, tight-lipped.

“He’s just my friend,” she said.

“For now,” he said. There was no mistaking the bitterness in his voice.

“So you’re saying you’re jealous because—”

“Yes,” he says, refusing to meet her eyes now. “Bit humiliating, isn’t it?”

This was it, she thought, as her pulse sped up. The fork in the wormhole. She could take his words at face value and release her hold on his arm, letting him return to his cabin to brood over his confession. She’d see him in the hall on one of the coming days and he would be as frosty and professional as ever. Or she could . . .

She pulled on his arm. He didn’t move. She tugged again, trying to get him to move closer.

“What?” he said, sullen and not understanding.

“Lieutenant,” she said, moving into his space. She put a hand on the back of his neck and kissed him. For a terrifying second, his mouth did not yield, a reluctance borne, maybe, of his decorum trying to set him to rights.

“Ensign,” he breathed, and in the next moment his mouth was very busy indeed.

She put her other arm behind his neck and pulled him closer. There was his tongue—who would have guessed that prim, proper Malcolm Reed knew how to tongue-kiss like that!— and his hands trailing down her back, cautious at first, then increasingly confident. He tasted good. He smelled good, like shampoo and aftershave. He _mmmed_ appreciatively when she pulled back and leaned in to nip at his jawline.

“Mmm?” she said, into his skin.

“Mmm,” he agreed, pulling her tight to him and hanging his head over her shoulder. With him close like this, she could appreciate in an entirely new way that he only had a couple inches on her. Nevertheless, he was just tall and broad enough to make her feel small and womanly. He stroked her hair as they stood there, absorbing what had just taken place.

She found his hand and led him, wordless, to the sofa. They both sat. Reed’s eyes shone. He looked expectant and a little cautious.

“What are you thinking?” she said.

He laughed in a strained way. “I’m thinking, ‘Don’t say anything to talk me out of this, please.’ ”

She touched his cheek. “I won’t.”

“I’m also thinking that you’ve pegged me for a dreadful hypocrite.” He shook his head.

She shook her head. “I haven’t.”

“All that fuss about fraternisation and then I go ahead and kiss you.” His hands were fidgety and she could see the officer in him trying to reassert control and retract what he’d just done.

“I think you’re overthinking it.” She leaned in and kissed him again. When she pulled back, she said, “I think you’re human, just like everyone else on this ship. Which I actually find relieving.”

His eyes fluttered open. “Why?”

“I like you,” she said. “I’ve liked you for awhile, in fact.”  
  
“Really.” He grinned. “I hadn’t any idea.” This time, he was the one to kiss her. A minute or two more passed, and a star in her began to go supernova, its building heat suffusing her neck, her cheeks, and all of her limbs.

“Malcolm.” She pulled back. “Can I call you Malcolm?”  
  
He gave her a lopsided smile. “Call me anything you’d like, love.”

She laughed. “I say you only call me that from now on. ‘Love.’” She brushed her fingertips against her own hot cheek. “It has a certain effect on me.”

“Oh?” Reed cocked an eyebrow.

Not that he could see all of the said effect he and his British endearments were having on her--one benefit of being a cisgender woman--but she hazarded a quick glance at his lap to see what sort of effect she might be having on him. She couldn’t tell for sure, but she thought his blue trousers looked a little tighter than they had when he’d first sat down. He didn’t seem to notice the glance.

“Yes. You know what I mean,” she said.

He leaned over and cupped the back of her head. “I’m afraid I’m rather daft.” He drew her face closer to his. “Going to have to spell it out for me, love.” His mouth opened against hers and tongue pushed inside, and he murmured when she returned the favour, just the faintest hint that he could, in fact, be capable of losing control of himself. And yet as they kissed, she couldn’t help but notice his propriety. One hand skimmed up and down her bicep, rumpling her pyjama top, seeming content to stay in polite territory, and the other rested on his thigh.

She broke their kiss again and grasped his idle hand. “You’re allowed to touch me, you know,” she said, placing it at her waist. “I don’t mind.” Which was a slight fib. She more than didn’t mind.

“I didn’t think I had the right to presume you wanted things to go beyond this,” he said, the hand on her bicep moving up so he could run a finger under her lower lip. He gave her another deep kiss, all tongue, to demonstrate ‘this’ and she had to swallow a groan. She wanted things to go beyond. Far beyond. Reed sat back.

“I’m giving you permission to presume now,” she said, looking meaningfully at him.

“Okay,” he said, nodding. He closed his eyes, as though the thought were too much to bear. “Okay.”

“If you want to,” she added. She was pretty sure he did, but it didn’t hurt to double-check.

He nodded again, opening his eyes. “I do, but I want you to know that I didn’t actually expect—I _don’t_ actually expect, ah … And there’s the matter of our rank, you know, I thought—”

“But do you want to?” she said, interrupting his recitation of misgivings. By this point, she was pretty sure they were both talking about _It_. Knocking boots, as he’d said earlier.

Reed dropped his eyes and visibly swallowed. “Yes. Very much so.” When he looked at her again, his expression was guarded. “I’m just a bit—thinking with my head, I guess you’d say.”

Nothing said that they couldn’t take it slower, of course, spool this out over a few visits, although that’s not what the building supernova was clamouring for. Still, she had to take Reed’s hesitation seriously. He was her superior officer, which didn’t bother her as their professional paths on the ship rarely intersected, but she knew that he was struggling right now with the illicitness of it. His station on the ship meant everything to him and everyone aboard knew it, and if he went any further with her tonight he might put it in serious jeopardy. She presumed that Captain Archer wouldn't really care, especially now that they’d just learned that a generational ship was a real possibility, if not inevitability, but there was no way of knowing for certain.

“I don’t want to push you,” she said, even though that wasn’t in the slightest bit true.

Reed shook his head and his mouth quirked. “No, I’m not fooling either of us. I was a goner from the moment you kissed me, Ensign.”

Ah. The supernova began to glow anew. “So it shouldn’t bother you to presume,” she said. She scooted away and sat just out of his reach.

He laughed and rubbed the back of his neck, considering her. “Well, you’ve certainly sussed that I’m not very good at making the first move.”

She smiled. “Second move. First move was mine. I kissed you, remember?”

“Second move isn’t my forte either.”

“You’re finding this agonising, aren’t you?” she teased.

“Well if there’s anything a tactical officer hates, it’s getting it wrong. We like a clever plan.” However, he moved closer until their thighs brushed.

“So presume that it’s a tactical manoeuvre. An attack. What would you do first?”

“Identify the weaknesses,” he said, smiling a bit wryly.

Now it was her turn to raise an eyebrow. “An enemy doesn’t tell you their weaknesses.”

“No.” He shifted closer and their thighs made a seam. “That requires careful research.” Sweeping her hair aside, he brought his mouth to the side of her neck and sucked. She closed her eyes and hoped that it would leave broken blood vessels that she would have to beseech Phlox to heal. She wanted someone else to know that this had happened, was happening. She was giddy. She wanted to shout to the stars, ‘I am going to fuck _Malcolm Reed_.’ Reed was too careful, though. Rather than increase the pressure, he licked a path up to her ear and then crimped the edges ever so gently with his teeth. One small whimper escaped her. “I may have found one,” he said in her ear, breath hot.

“Found what?” she said, her voice embarrassingly tremulous. His breath made her knees weak.

“A weakness.” His hand was now hovering at her collarbone and she realised in short order that he was beginning to undo the buttons of her long-sleeve pyjama shirt. “I've a feeling there may be others.” Ensign Millay watched him work, feeling almost faint with anticipation. Reed unfastened the buttons one-handed, his lips slightly pursed in concentration. When he finished, he pushed the top off her shoulders matter-of-factly and rolled the sleeves down her wrists one arm at a time until he could discard the shirt on the floor. Beneath it, she was wearing a modest regulation blue sports bra. From the way he looked at her, though, she felt more like she was wearing something lacy and see-through.

She was far less interested in what was beneath her shirt, though; that was old news to her. What wasn’t old news was what was beneath his regulation black shirt. She slid a hand beneath the hem of his shirt and his undershirt and up the center of his chest. His flesh was warm and firm with muscle, his chest hair sparse. She moved the hand over onto his pectoral and rubbed a nipple, experimenting.

“What’s this?” he said. His voice sounded slightly strangled.

“Opposition research for a counter-attack,” she said, continuing to circle the nipple with her fingertip.

He closed his eyes. “Fucking hell, Ensign.”

“I’ve never heard you swear before,” she said, licking his ear as she continued teasing him. “It’s hot.”

He seized her more roughly then and wasted no time in putting his tongue back into her mouth. She withdrew her hand from his shirt and clutched him back, and for the next minute they kissed each other breathless. When he pulled away, he said, “Here.” He drew his legs onto the sofa and eased her between them until she was on top of him, palms flat on his chest and elbows out to the side. The position brought her in contact with his lower half and she was able to confirm at last that the supernova burning in her had engulfed him too.

“Malcolm,” she breathed, as he grasped her waist to situate her more comfortably on him and brought her into closer contact with his erection. Strangely, calling him by his given name still felt intimate—more intimate, maybe, than having his hard-on jammed against her pubic bone.

“Why’d we wait three bloody years to do this?” he said, a little breathless.

She traced his lips and he kissed her fingers. “I didn’t think you liked me that way. I didn’t think you liked me much at all, actually.”

“Well, I expect you’ve sussed out that I was trying my hardest not to feel that way, let alone expect you’d feel the same. It would hardly have been appropriate,” he said, as though reading her mind.

“And yet?” she said.

“And yet …” His hand palmed one of her buttocks and he kneaded it. “Gosh, you’ve got a bloody marvellous arse.”

She rocked her hips against his, once, to see what kind of reaction it brought. He bit his lip and his hand stilled. She tried it again.

“If you’re trying to get my attention,” he said, “you’ve got it, alright?"

She smiled and sat up, her groin deliciously flush against his as she brought her hands to the hem of his shirt. Without saying anything, she began drawing it up and off his torso. Beneath was his standard-issue blue undershirt. They all wore so many layers in space. “Now, about those weaknesses,” she said.

“I suppose you might have found one or two.”

“Such as …?”

He cupped her bottom again and squeezed. “I’m a bit of what they call a bum man.”

“Isn’t it counterintuitive to offer the enemy sensitive information?” she said.

“Yes,” he said, sitting up. He clasped her and began licking her ear again. Then, before she could react, he grabbed the back of her sports bra and tore it over her head.

“Mal—oh.” The other syllable of his name disappeared in a moan because he’d begun licking her nipple. She’d forgotten how nice this was, and sank back on her hands a little bit, transported. “Ohh.”

He licked some more and then introduced teeth, not enough to hurt, just enough to add an edge to the pleasure. She carded a hand into his thick brown hair and surrendered. When at last he raised his head, he gave her a sly grin. “Lured you into a trap, didn’t I?”

In response, she shoved her tongue back into his mouth. She’d lost all sense of time; her body was molten as the supernova swelled. No longer shy, Reed was exploring her skin with his mouth and hands: back, waist, breasts, stomach, arms. In the midst of it, she managed to wrestle the undershirt from him and pressed her chest against his, almost swooning at the sensation. Ultimately, they ended up in a panting tangle in her bed, still wearing their trousers.

“Are we going to do this?” she said, breaking away from a long, probing kiss. They were lying on their sides. Reed nodded, wordless. His blue eyes looked five shades darker in the dim room, and there was something guarded in them. She wondered if he was worrying again about how taboo this was. Who hurt him, she wondered, to make him so cautious and inhibited? To his unspoken fears, she said, “It’s okay.”

“I’m not sure I care anymore whether it is or isn’t,” he said. His smile was a little pained.

“Last chance to abort the battle,” she said, only half-joking.

“Abort the …? Oh, the metaphor,” he said. He’d been glancing down at her breasts. “It’s a Millay victory, naturally. I totally surrender.”

In response, she moved her hand down and palmed him for the first time. He was marble-hard beneath her touch. She squeezed and the stoic, disciplined tactical officer named Malcolm Reed obliged with a faint grunt. There was suddenly nothing more important to her than seeing what his cock looked like. She worked at the button and zip, then put both sets of forefingers into the waistband of his trousers and briefs and tugged until the object of her interest was free. Reed sucked in a breath as she touched him. It was dim in the room, but she could see that he was well-proportioned, not the impossibly well-endowed lover of the pornographic holonovels she skimmed from time to time, nor under-endowed by any means. In a word, he was perfect. She set about divesting herself of her own trousers and briefs as fast as possible. He stripped his own all of the way off, matching her urgency.

When she was free of clothing, she gripped his right shoulder and put her right leg over his flank without preamble, opening herself up and easing down. He slipped a couple times before he found purchase. When he did, it was pleasure beyond imagining. He grabbed her right buttock and pushed up into her.

“Oh!” he said, the first full-throated cry he’d uttered.

“Malcolm,” she said, kissing his cheeks all over.

“Oh, yes,” he said more quietly, settling into a slow, steady rhythm.

“Yes,” she said.

Their tongues met. He pushed and eased back, and pushed.

“God,” he said, an oath left over from an age when Terrans still believed in higher beings.

She ran her hand through his thick, wonderful hair and stroked his ear, scarcely daring to believe that this man was hers to do with what she wanted. Reed had ideas of his own, though. Without breaking contact, he manoeuvred her onto her back and climbed on top of her. She could now run her hands down the muscled slope of his back to his buttocks. His weight was exciting, and she groaned.

“You like this, darling?” Reed said, punctuating the comment with a thrust that was absolutely sublime.

She nodded. He straightened up a little and looked down so he could watch himself push into her. She watched too. His strokes were slow and firm, almost too pleasurable to bear.

“This too, love?” he said, sucking in a breath as he watched them.

“Yes. You’re amazing.” She ran a finger over his lips and looked at his face, mesmerised by him watching himself fucking her.

“You feel incredible.”

“You too.”

Gradually, he began to thrust faster and deeper. “So good,” he said. He cradled the top of her head in his hands and drove into her faster, more urgently. She flexed her hips to deepen the angle and Reed gasped. He stopped, breathing hard.

“Okay?” she said, stroking his hair.

“Yes. Sorry, I’m being selfish.” He kissed her cheek. “It’s been a long time since I’ve done this.”

“I want you to be selfish,” she said.

He pulled out of her and she protested. “No, no. I won’t last much longer if I’m selfish,” he said.

“I don’t mind,” she said, as he clambered to his hands and knees.

“I want you to feel good, too. Do you mind?” He glanced down and gestured.

Her pulse quickened. “I mean, do you want to?”

He grinned a lopsided, winsome grin. “Of course I want to, you silly woman,” he said. Then in a more decisive voice: “Now …”

He flattened his arms on either side of her thighs, pressing his thumbs into her hips, and bent his head. The first swirl of his tongue on her clitoris was the best sensation she’d felt on the entire voyage. She couldn’t remember the last time a man had done this—certainly not within the last five years. Reed dipped his tongue lower and licked up in a sure, firm stroke, then looked up, eyes gleaming. “You’ve got a nice one,” he said. “Whatever the space slang is for it these days.” With that, he closed his eyes and went back to work, and if him fucking her had been ecstasy, this was the level above ecstasy. Hyper-ecstasy. Warp 6 ecstasy.

However bad Reed thought his stamina was, hers was far worse. Within five minutes or thereabouts, she was there, a supernova just moments from collapsing. “Malcolm,” she warned, “I think—”

“Uh-huh,” he said, the two fingers that had found their way inside her crooking, tongue not slowing. “Go on.”

When her climax came, the tipping point was not Reed’s clever fingers or his even cleverer tongue, but his reaching down to stroke himself as if he couldn’t possibly go one more second without relief.

The crazy things she shouted in the heat of the moment were, thankfully, lost to her short-term memory. As she came back down, all she was aware of was Reed gently kissing her inner thigh. “Alright, love?” he said, looking up at her with mild concern.

She laughed. “Don’t be modest. Come here.”

He flopped onto his side alongside her again and grinned. His face glistened in strategic spots.

“I made a mess of you,” she said. She dabbed his chin and upper lip with the bedsheet.

“Thank you,” he said earnestly. “For letting me do that.”

She laughed and kissed the tip of his nose. “I’ve been thanked for giving before, but never receiving.” Below, she curled her fingers around the length of him. “What about this, though?”

“It’s still quite interested, if that’s what you’re asking,” Reed said, his breath hitching.

“I’m still interested too,” she said, aching to have him back inside her. The orgasm had barely taken the edge of her desire.

“I was wondering …” he said.

“Hmm?” She slid her hand lazily up and down his cock.

“You’re going to have to stop that so I can concentrate on talking,” he said, frowning in a mock-stern way.

“Mmm.” She let go and put her hand on his thigh, which was solid with muscle.

“I’ve got this—I had this—fantasy.” He swallowed. “About us.”

Her heart began pounding again. “You fantasised about us?” The revelation was a gift.

“I did. I would imagine us standing at the porthole of your cabin looking out at the stars. Then I would kiss you and …” He giggled in a nervous way. “I’m mad to tell you this.”

“Don’t keep me in suspense,” she said.

“I just thought, people used to fantasise about making love beneath the stars and here we are out among them. What a wasted opportunity not to take advantage. I’d like to make love to you while we watched the stars.”

“Mmm.” She kissed him, hand on the side of his face. “Will you do that now?”He nodded. They sat up and he grasped her hand in his large one, leading her to the porthole. The ship was still only travelling at warp factor one, so the stars passed by in the blackness at a lazy speed.

“How did you picture it?” she said.

“Like this.” He kissed her, modestly at first, but with increasing fervour. After a few moments, he said against her mouth, “There would normally be some ripping off of clothes at this point, but obviously we’ve taken care of that.”  
  
“Then?” she said. She was aching, aching to have him back inside her.

“Stand like this,” he said, nudging the insides of her bare feet with his sock feet. “Feet apart. Arse out, hands on either side of the porthole.” He spoke in such a casual way that it could almost be a training session in the armoury. He grabbed her right hip and his other hand busied itself behind them. In the next moment, he was at her entrance again. He pushed up. At first, only the first inch or so of him was inside, and the desperation to have the rest of him forced a whine from her throat. “Easy, love,” he said. He put his other hand beneath her left breast. “Easy.” He pushed in another inch and she fought the urge to slam back against him. She could feel he was being deliberate.

“Please,” she said.

Then he was inside her all the way, a satisfying fullness she couldn’t get enough of. He groaned and slid his hands down to her hips, and pulled her flush against him so that he went deeper still. She tried to watch the stars, but kept closing her eyes.

“I’ve wanted this for so long,” Reed whispered. “Wanted you.” The hand on her right hip dropped and his finger ghosted over her clitoris. Pressing her hands against the wall, the only way she could express her gratitude was to arch her back so he went deeper again.

“Can you go faster?” she said.

“I could, but it mightn’t be to your advantage,” he said, the finger on her clitoris swivelling. “I’m not quite sure I’ve got it in me to hold back.”

“Don’t hold back,” she begged.

He groaned. “I’m not quite ready.”

“I want you.”

“I was rather hoping this could last,” he said, now audibly panting and moving faster, apparently in spite of himself. “More than a few seconds, anyway.”

“We can go again tomorrow morning,” she said. “Tomorrow night, too.”

“You’d really … fancy … that?” he said, in between thrusts.

His thrusts were hitting so perfectly that for a moment she couldn’t speak. In tandem with the rhythm of his finger, the thrusts were tipping her toward the brink again. “I’m close,” she said.

“I’m not just ... a one-off?”

“Faster, Macolm, _please_.”

His finger moved nimbly and he fucked her faster. Seconds later, she came joyously and gratefully, shouting his name. Thank starship engineers for soundproof walls.

“Darling,” he said, bracing a hand under her breasts when she’d finished. He panted. “With your permission, darling.”

“Please,” she begged. “Please.”

“Oh my god. Oh, God,” he said. He drove himself against her at an erratic pace and she felt the moment that he lost it, stilling for a moment, then another moment, then another, until he’d stopped moving and slipped out of her. He rested his forehead on her back, breathing hard.

She’d all but forgotten the stars, but as he caught his breath she noticed them again, whisking by like fireflies in the night. She’d never found them so lovely.

Afterwards, they tidied up in the loo together. Reed turned his back modestly as he wiped himself off. She was in a slightly messier state. It was her first time having sex since the voyage. While she and Malcolm, like all of the crew, were on birth control, the feeling of his semen seeping out of her was strange. She’d only used condoms on Earth and had to remind herself there was no danger during the voyage in doing without.

“What kinds of embarrassing things did I shout during that?” she said, when she’d made herself a little more presentable.

Reed appeared over her shoulder and met her eyes in the mirror, grinning. “Things I am committing to memory for the rest of my life,” he said.

She turned and kissed him on the lips. They held each other for several moments. His cock had gone back to its resting state earlier, the foreskin covering the head, but as they embraced it began to stir again. She looked down, amused. “So soon?”

“It’s got a mind of its own sometimes,” he said. “Although in this case”—he paused to cup one of her buttocks—“can’t really blame it, can I?”

She kissed him in response.

“I suppose I’d better be going,” Reed said, when they broke apart. “My shift starts at 0800.”

“You can stay the night,” she said, hoping he’d answer in the affirmative.

“You're sure? I don’t want to impose.”

She pecked him on the lips. “Dead sure.”

He smiled, looking the happiest she thought she’d ever seen him.

They brushed their teeth, Reed using an unopened spare she found in the cupboard, and then gathered their clothing from the floor and her bed. She pulled on her pyjama bottoms and top, Reed redressed in his underwear and undershirt. It was too cold, even under the blankets, to sleep in the nude. When they were both beneath the covers, Reed wrapped her arms around her and she wished she could freeze time. She’d make this night last forever. The Xindi, the Expanse, the dead members of the crew seemed very remote. She felt warm with adoration and lust for Reed, safe in his embrace.

He broke the silence. “When I came by, I didn’t intend on ending up in your bed.” He was apparently determined on impressing this point upon her.

“I don’t care if you did,” she said. “I’m just glad you’re here.”

“I just don’t want you to think that I had other motives, as it were.”

“It’s okay, your honour is still intact as far as I’m concerned.” She nestled her head against his chest. “What was your motive? If it wasn’t this?”

He smiled and kissed her forehead. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining!” he said. “When I went back to my quarters, apart from kicking myself for being an utter cad, I was thinking about what would happen if we do get stuck out here and you decide to make it official with Corporal Chang. I decided I’d regret not saying anything, just in case there was a chance …”

“A chance?”

“That you might prefer me to him,” he said, a bit wryly. “By some miracle. Or leave him for me.”

“Malcolm,” she said, stern. “I told you earlier, there’s nothing going on between me and Corporal Chang. I don’t end up with him.” She pulled back to take a good look at him.

He appeared mildly surprised. “You don’t?”

“I told you I don’t.”

“So who is it then? Who do you end up with?”

“I never asked. I don’t want to know.”

Now Reed really did look surprised. “Why not?”

“I don’t like the idea of my future being set in stone. It bothers me. What if they tell me I die before the generational ship even comes about? Why would I want to know that?”

“I guess I’d never thought of it that way,” he said. “Everyone was just getting news about their descendants. That sort of thing.” He stroked her hair.

“I don’t know if this other Enterprise is the future, anyway. It seems more likely they’re a parallel universe that somehow broke through. Part of Everett’s relative state formulation.”

“I see,” said Reed. “Nothing going on with our good doctor, either?”

Now it was her turn to be surprised. “You’re kidding, right?”

He laughed. “Yes.” He winked. “Mostly. You do spend an awful lot of time with him.”

“Of course I do! He’s the only alien aboard this ship. I get to see us through his eyes. We’re the aliens to him. It’s given me a whole new perspective on humans.”

“T’Pol,” Reed reminded.

“Vulcans don’t seem alien compared with Denobulans. Their faces don’t puff up when you accidentally surprise them!” she said, pausing as she thought about Phlox. “Actually Denobulans are very reserved when it comes to touching and sex. They’re more careful than us. Physical touch is very important to them and they only use it when they’re sure the other person is okay with it. And they hardly ever kiss.” She leaned forward and kissed Reed searchingly, glad she wasn’t a Denobulan. “They rely much more on scent and pheromones than we do. You wouldn’t think they were so careful since they’re married to multiple people, but that’s how they are. When Dr. Phlox talks about humans, he’s only being realistic based upon what he’s observed. He’s more honest about us than we are.”

“What’s your honest opinion of me?” Reed asked. His eyes searched hers.

“How do you mean?” she said.

“Well. Am I just a one-off?”

She stroked his cheek with a thumb. “You tell me.”

He gave a lopsided smile. “I was hoping I might not be. That you might keep me around for a bit.”

She yawned as the last of the adrenaline faded from her body and the day’s hard labour began catching up to her. “I’d be happy to keep you around for as long as you’d like.” She kissed him and he drew her close.

“Good,” he said, looking satisfied. “I’d like that.”

She smiled. A few minutes later she was asleep, wrapped in Reed’s arms, snuggled against his chest.

Dr. Phlox was used to pheromones in the way humans were used to background noise. It hadn’t been that way at first. At first, humans had smelled downright dreadful. He had to physically stop himself sometimes from wrinkling his nose the way that the crew members did at Porthos when the captain hadn’t bathed him in a few weeks. It was surprising to him when he first read about humans that they had lost the ability to detect their own pheromones. He, on the other hand, could smell when one of them had a disease, one of them was menstruating, or one of them was in estrus. The males filled the corridors and mess hall with their scent most heavily in the mornings; that, he soon deduced, was testosterone. The females’ scent was a low hum in comparison, which never peaked since the birth control made them (the ones whose birth sex had been female, that is) anovulatory. Regardless of males, females, and everyone in between being on birth control, there were always sexual pheromones in the air. He could detect without fail the telltale odours of human courtship and sexual activity. As he had told Ensign Millay, there was a lot more of this than the captain would have suspected. The humans went to great pains to disguise it, and he found their modesty amusing. He’d told Ensign Millay before that they’d all be a lot happier if they were just open about their need to copulate. There was nothing shameful in it, after it. It was as natural as eating or drinking, or having to trim one’s toenails on a weekly basis.

Anyway, he barely smelled the miasma of hormones as he walked into the mess hall that morning; he was fixated on the scent of Terran breakfast sausages which, though they only had a faint resemblance to Denobulan sausage, were still quite tasty. He skipped the eggs and fruit, took a triple helping of sausages, and sat down at an empty table to enjoy them. By now the crew recognised that he was no conversationalist at meals and left him to eat by himself.

It was only when he had finished that he noticed Lieutenant Reed and Ensign Millay—or rather, their odours—at the table next to him. A human might have detected something amiss in the peculiar smiles and the glances that they gave one another, but the giveaway to Phlox was the scent of sexual pheromones. They weren’t as strong as they had been when Reed had stormed past him in the corridor at around 2130 hours last evening, but they were still quite potent.

Ah. Of course. That was it.

It was plain to see that there had been some sort of quarrel of the romantic variety, hence the storming through the corridor, but they had resolved it through sexual activity. A common human solution. Good. He chuckled to himself.

“Congratulations, you two,” he said, smiling, when he passed them to return his meal tray.

Why they should have looked so shocked was beyond him. Anyone could have deduced what was going on, even a species with barely functional olfactory glands.

**Author's Note:**

> Long-time Trekkie here. 
> 
> I honestly cannot recall when I first started this story. I think I began it in 2013 or 2014. I found it, unfinished, in my drafts a few months ago, read it, and thought, 'Hey, this isn't half bad. Why didn't you ever finish it?' By the time I reread it, it had been years since I'd watched Enterprise and I couldn't even remember if Corporal Chang was an actual character from the show or one that I had made up. I'm normally not an OC kind of gal since I have a deathly fear of the Mary Sue label, but I didn't feel like going the Hoshi or T'Pol routes on this one.
> 
> Anyway, I'd be interested to know if my readers can find the seam where I joined the original section of the story to the new one. As always, I really appreciate comments! I have had zero activity in the Enterprise fandom, so I'm highly curious to see how many people are interested in ENT fan fic.


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